Cap'n Lee wrote: NotRich wrote:When it comes to something like that, the idea is surely around how you manage to convince somebody of your way of thinking.
If I have a compelling argument why you should move out of the way, or at least a informative and interesting point around the approaching danger, you'd probably be more inclined to listen.
but i'm being illogical, i'm refusing to believe that the bus is there. there is no compelling argument when I refuse to believe in the central figure. There is no argument about why to be christian that you can use on someone who is flat out refusing to believe in God or the Debil etc. I don't believe in God therefore there is nothing he could promise me that would convince me to be a christian, I have nothing to fear from the debil because i don't believe he has any control and I have nothing to fear from a bus that I don't acknowledge the existence of.
Sorry, I didn't really process the original point as fully as I should've done. Ok, if there's someone flat out refusing to take a belief in religion then there's no real way to convince them. I see what you mean about the stubborn-ness that comes from a lot of anti-religious types.
I'm not entirely against the idea of religion, and I suppose what I was getting at is that if someone put a case together that I found fairly convincing around the existence and/or influence of "God", then i'd perhaps be inclined to change my viewpoint.
But the flaw is that a lot of preaching that goes on just doesn't offer that whatsoever.
Cap'n Lee wrote: NotRich wrote:I'm in the Non Religious camp. I just find the concept of God incredibly hard to take in on a personal level. Plus there's so much science out there to refute the teachings of modern religions.
Well, science doesn't have an answer for the creation of the universe, just as religions have truths, science has laws. Historians are the bastards disproving the word in the Bible et al.
No, i'm certainly not suggesting that science is the direct alternative to religion. And yes, a lot of science is based just on theoretical assumptions, including the key things around creation of the universe and whatnot.
But again, on a personal level, I see much more evidence presented to me in the cause of scientific explanations than I do when it comes to religion.
Whilst we're on that, there was an absolute tool of a man being interviewed in the Metro yesterday (Lee, save your Metro rant for elsewhere
) discussing science and religion. Just tripped over himself a lot for a man that's written a book on the subject. Here's some of what he had to say:
Metro wrote:
Dr Andrew Parker, 41, is a biologist at Oxford University. His latest book, The Genesis Enigma: Why The Bible Is Scientifically Accurate, claims the story of Genesis matches the history of the universe so accurately it could only have been written with divine intervention.
Have you proved the existence of God?
I don’t think I’ve proved the existence of God. I’ve proved there is space in the universe where God might exist.
It would be quite a scoop.
Well, yes. But if I find evidence there isn’t a God then as a scientist that would satisfy me too.
Isn’t this another example of religion masquerading as science?
Absolutely not. I devoted most of my early career to science and leaned toward being an atheist. That’s changed during the writing of this book, which revealed surprising parallels between Genesis and the scientific history of the universe. Not only is the sequence of events in Genesis scientifically correct but some of the events themselves are really quite precise, which would have been impossible for a human to know at that time. You have to conclude that either the author made extremely lucky guesses or something strange was going on: divine inspiration.
That’s a massive leap, isn’t it?
To say there’s something mysterious going on is probably not too great a leap. What I reveal is something beyond human intelligence, beyond testing with scientific equipment.
In Genesis, God creates the earth in six days, makes man out of dust and there’s no mention of the Big Bang. If it was written with God’s help, why is so much wrong?
It’s the authors adding their artistic interpretation, shoehorning the facts into the type of story people would be able to understand.
You say the second ‘Let there be light…’ refers to the evolution of the eye but you edited out the rest of the line, which clearly refers to the Sun, Moon and stars. There’s no mention in Genesis of the evolution of the eye.
Um, OK. I’ll probably have a look at this in more detail again. The first page of the Bible doesn’t spell out the eye but it doesn’t spell out any of the science in detail.
Your argument seems full of holes.
I would say it’s the best guess with the best fit.
Is there any real evidence, or just speculation?
If you want to say it’s 100 per cent evidence for God, no. With this book, there might be indirect evidence – it’s the strongest evidence for the existence of God I’ve come across. I’m not sure how you would describe it.
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